SHAMROCK RUN BABY!

At the end of last week I had 6 Shamrock Run registrations (4 not counting mine & Tom's). I was sweatin' it a little bit. Today I have 18 total and possibly two or three more. Kinda crazy how things work out.

Will be handing these babies off on Thursday!

2013 Tee Shirt

Goal Reached and Passed!

As of today I have 28.6 miles for the month of January! Not bad considering some of our runs were plagued with a little black ice and a little snow. There were quite a few very cold mornings and just for something different - I had to get on the treadmill (booo). I'm not done yet, there are still a few days, so I'm sure that I'll log a couple more miles before next Wednesday.

Will start ramping up a bit the first Monday in February when we start training for the Shamrock 8k. Woo Hoo!

Event Planning

Cycle Oregon Weekend Ride 2010

With the Shamrock run less than two months away, I am starting to think about the events that I want to participate in this year. There are a couple that I HAVE to do - and both have become favorites in the last 5 years. The first being the Shamrock run. It's fun to see so many different runners on the road...from the super speedy to the just barely running. So encouraging to see so many people out on the road in an event that has been called the official first run of the "racing" season. Oh, if you are reading this and want to be a part of the team I am putting together, go to www.shamrockrunportland.com and fill out the form and get the completed form and your money to me this weekend and I'll make sure that it is included with all the ones I have now. The team fee is $32...checks made out to yours truly...

Must do event #2 is the Independence Day run in Ridgefield. I don't know why I decided I wanted to do that run, but I'm glad that I did. I think this will be th 5th time running it this year. It's smaller, but oh so family friendly. I LOVE to see parents out on the course with their young runners, coaching them all the way. So fun!

Tom and I only did one time trial last year, so that will have to go back on the schedule this year. Along with that, the Tour de Blast may be changing the ride date to sometime in September instead of mid-June. The last two that we did were not enjoyable at all. So have haven't done this ride in the past two years.

We have decided to do more running events and less cycling events. Running events are so easy and usually close to home too. Too much has to go with us for a cycling event, but I have to admit that I have missed some of  our faves, like the Peach of a Century, Monster Cookie and the Covered Bridge ride. Those rides are out of Salem and Albany, so I'm cool with not doing them ;)

As the year goes on and more events come up, I'll be posting those here. I am hoping to do another triathlon...what am I supposed to do with a wet suit?

Here's to an event filled year with my hubby who is pretty much healed up from his surgery last Spring!

1.7

(google images)

miles from meeting my goal AND there are 6 days left in the month!

Today Tom and I will be heading out and doing a little hill training. Down Bliss Road and through Shorecrest Terrace and BACK up the monster hill to Hathaway Road...yeah...it's gonna be great!

The cool thing is that I have already mapped it out and if we do the loop two times it will be 2.05 miles :)

Tomorrow will be long run day - possibly 3 miles or more depending on how I feel. Hoping for a nice, not so wet morning run.

Registrations for Shamrock are due next week, so I'm going to get myself a new running plan to train for the 8k distance. It will be a 7 week plan, but 5 miles is almost a breeze compared to the 7.5 miles that we did a couple of months ago! Kind of...

Pace Bunny, you're my new best friend!

Foolish Decision...

If I knew what the weather would be like after work today I think I would have dragged myself out the door at o'dark thirty to do my run this morning, but nooooo...I thought I might want a change of pace, try an afternoon run.

Bah! Stupid drizzle...It will be a cool-ish AND wet run. Gosh, how much fun is that?

Do I get out of bed early for a run or ???? What does the magic forecast have in store for us? Patchy fog...hmmm....I guess we'll find out tomorrow!

KOIN 6 7 Day Forecast



Back on the Dreadmill

"my" treadmill at the office

With pace bunny breathing down my back ;) and Mr. Tom not feeling well I had to drag my stuff with me to work and get on the 'mill during my lunch break today. It was just okay. Maybe tomorrow won't be so bad. I'm getting there with my 25 miles in January goal though. I only have 8 more miles to run so it's all good.

Right now I'm trying to get into a regular running plan by running Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday. This week I had the hardest time wanting to get up on Monday and run outside while it was 24 degrees. It's not like we haven't done that before, because we did a couple of weeks ago. I guess I felt especially cold and a little tired too. So this week is a Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday then Saturday kind of week.

So, tomorrow I'm back on the treadmill and then a road run on Saturday. I may be running by myself for a few more days :( Which is okay because it kind of makes me want to run a little faster so I can get done and back home as soon as I can. It CAN be a little creepy. I don't know why because I was running by myself for several weeks before Tom was okay'd to run again.

Anyway...my love hate relationship is back on with the treadmill...yaaay.

Slippin' and Slidin'

(google images)

Yeah, so yesterday I posted about running the Salmon Creek trail out and back which put us at 6 miles today. WELL, there were some things that I wanted to accomplish today besides a run so I decided that we should just do a run that starts from our back door instead. It's good that I thought to do that because there were some spots that were a little slippery! I can see it now...I would do one of those fancy moves that you see in the cartoons and somehow do a flip and then land on my head. Okay, maybe not that spectacular, but you get the idea.

Even though the side of the road we were running on was mostly clear and not slick, there was a spot that is near HB Fuller that is in the shade during the winter months and you know, shade breeds icy patches!

To make things even better, at one point as we were heading back home, I decided that it would be fun to cross the street and run on the opposite side of the street where the sidewalks are slickery. Yup, more shade. It made for an interesting last half mile or so of our run. My pace was about a minute slower than my previous outings. I figure I was trying not to fall down, so it's all good.

SO - if the sidewalks and some of the pavement not far from our house were slick could you imagine the SC Trail where a lot of the trail would be shaded. It would be not good.

Enough said!

PS - I'm 5.2 miles into my goal. I'm pretty sure that I'll meet my goal - even in the 80% or 90% rain in the forecast for the coming week. Today was 80%, but it was not to be...I LOVE that 80% means 80% no rain!

Running Goals?

Runningahead.com is my go to when I want to map out a route and record my run stats. It's a nifty site and there is an option to record more than just running. Go ahead, check it out...you know you want to ;)

Today as I was pokin' around looking at stuff I figured out that I have WIDGETS that I can enter to my summary page. I think I may get myself into some trouble - I can enter a monthly goal and record my runs and it will let me know how well I'm doing or how much of a slacker I'm turning into!

So, for January I have decided that we should run 25 miles by the 31st. It's the 4th so I have all sorts of time! However, according to the "pace bunny" I am currently 1.1 miles behind my mileage pace and will only complete 16 miles if I don't get going on this! It is only the 4th, so the pace bunny is being a little pushy at this point.

Tomorrow we are going to up the ante and run the Salmon Creek trail - out and back. That's 6 miles baby! I don't necessarily enjoy the trail, but it's close to home and I won't have to try to figure out what the distance is that we are running. So that's a plus!

Check back soon to see if I'm keeping up with my goals or not - I think I'll try to add the runningahead widget to this blog - for all to see...hee hee.

Enjoy the weekend!